She needed to be kicked in the head.
Or maybe she just needed more wine.
But the truth was, you couldn’t force chemistry between two people, and she had been pretending that she could. Since she wrestled everything else in her life into submission, she had figured this would work the same way. Unfortunately, her libido wasn’t listening and refused to ignite.
“Manpanion in the goofiest word I’ve ever heard,” Tamara said, turning and exchanging her empty glass for a full one, not even able to bring herself to feel guilty about it. She was starting to feel a little desperate.
“It fits him. Goofy.”
“Don’t hold back. Tell me how you really feel about him.” Bad enough that she knew he was basically a nerd, did Suzanne have to point it out, too?
That brought a contrite expression to Suzanne’s face. Her friend, the one who had stood there in the hospital with her and held her hand when the doctors told her that Pete was dead, squeezed her hand now. “I’m sorry, sweetie, I’m being rude, aren’t I? I just want you to be happy, and you really don’t look happy. He’s not your type at all. You’re a driver’s wife, Tammy.”
Tamara felt her chest tighten. “Was. I was a driver’s wife. I said I wouldn’t go there again, Suz, you know that. I’d rather have boring than live with that fear again. I don’t want a life where racing consumes every minute of every day anymore.” She had loved the sport, still did, but this time around she needed a man with a regular nine-to-five job, who came home for dinner, and who cut the grass on the weekend. A man who didn’t drive around the track at one hundred and eighty-five miles an hour every weekend, tempting fate. She meant that.
Suzanne squeezed her hand again, then dropped it. “I understand. But there has to be a happy medium, sugar. Because unless that man over there is hiding a penis the size of an anaconda in his shit brown pants, you are too young, too pretty, too successful, and too much fun to settle for that.”
That made Tamara laugh, though she wasn’t sure she deserved the label fun anymore. Truth be told, she was as unadventurous as Geoffrey these days, and that had come about partly as a result of the demands of single parenthood and partly from conscious choice. She had aspired to a predictable lifestyle, and Geoffrey would fit perfectly into that equation.
So why couldn’t she bring herself to like him?
Because maybe somewhere deep inside her she still felt the need for speed. For excitement.
For the thrill of the race. Which was ridiculous given that she was a thirty-two-year-old widow with two kids and a career. There was no place for wild, not when she was her kids’
whole world, their only parent, their security. But maybe there was room for a little plain old fun. Maybe she had swung too far the other way and did need to loosen up. “Thanks, Suz. You know I love you.”
“I love you, too.” Suzanne glanced over at her, eyebrow raised. “Is there an anaconda?” she asked, like it had suddenly occurred to her she could be totally wrong.
Tamara should only be so lucky. “No, there’s no anaconda, I can promise you that.” Not even a garden snake.
“Damn, I’m sorry.”
“Me, too.”
There was a pause when Tamara imagined they were both trying not to picture Geoffrey naked, then Suzanne smoothed her hands down the front of her red dress and tucked her hair back.
“Just do me a favor and think about what you really want. Don’t settle, sweetie, okay?”
Tamara wanted to fluff Suzanne’s words off, but she knew her friend was worried about her, and frankly, she was worried about herself. Forcing herself to date a man she felt no attraction to, and as a result finding herself slinging back wine to fight off a panic attack, wasn’t exactly taking a positive turn.
Suz was right—there had to be something in between deadly dull and wild girl. “Thanks, hon, I do have some thinking to do.” Like how to break things off with Geoffrey before he whipped it out for the night.
“Good girl. Now I have to go network and earn my keep as a board member. You okay by yourself?”
“Yeah. You go ahead. I know half the people here.” It was time to mingle. To move on.
Suzanne had managed to voice all of Tamara’s niggling concerns out loud, and she knew what she needed to do. She needed to quit standing in the corner feeling sorry for herself and acknowledge that the weekend was her doing, and now she needed to undo it. She was the one who had invited Geoffrey. If she truly didn’t like him as anything more than a friend and coworker, she needed to cut bait when they got home. She’d rather be alone than miserable, and he deserved someone who fully appreciated him. There was also no way she could have sex with him that night, not given that just entertaining the idea had her body feeling like she’d jumped into the Arctic for an extended swim.
It wasn’t fair to Geoffrey to lead him on, and it wasn’t fair to her to have to fake an orgasm.
Again.
Maybe she could say she had a headache or claim the shrimp hadn’t agreed with her to avoid the whole sex thing altogether. Of course, she could just break up with him, but it seemed downright awful to dump the man in the middle of the weekend. The nicer thing to do would be to wait until they were home, but then she was stuck wiggling out of whatever amorous plans he had for the evening. She’d put herself into a hell of a pickle.
Tamara glanced around the room, resolutely looking away from where Geoffrey was standing. It was a well-planned party, with lovely hors d’oeuvres and a quality quartet playing softly at the opposite end of the room. She would probably be enjoying herself if she weren’t hiding from her date. Determined to stop being a stick and make the most of the disastrous weekend she had created, Tamara turned resolutely to follow Suzanne out into the crowd.
And walked straight into someone. Tamara jumped back, but it was too late. Her wine had splashed all down the front of the guy she’d slammed into.
“Oh my God, I’m so sorry!” Tamara winced as she accessed the damage. The red wine had turned his pale gray shirt rust from collar to waistband. It wasn’t just a few droplets, it was the whole glass, and it was everywhere.
She looked up and immediately felt her cheeks start to burn. One, because she had never seen this man in her life, and therefore couldn’t joke it off with a long-standing acquaintance. And two, because he was damn cute, with caramel-colored hair that was getting a little long on his forehead, shoulders that were broad and begging to be tested for firmness with a squeeze, and compelling, deep, brown eyes that had widened in shock from the impact.